Salena Godden

Salena Godden FRSL is an award-winning author, poet and broadcaster of mixed Jamaican-Irish heritage based in London. Her work has been widely anthologised and broadcast on BBC Radio, TV and film and she consistently headlines poetry events and international book festivals.

Her 2021 debut novel 'Mrs Death Misses Death' was published by Canongate Books. It won the Indie Book Award for Fiction and the People’s Book Prize and was shortlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize and the British Book Awards. A highly anticipated second novel set in the 'Mrs Death Misses Death' universe titled 'The Life Of Life' will be published by Canongate in 2027.

Other recent books include the literary childhood memoir 'Springfield Road' and a new full poetry collection 'With Love, Grief and Fury' also published by Canongate in 2024. 'With Love, Grief and Fury' was shortlisted for the Books Are My Bag Readers Awards and received a Special Commendation from The Poetry Book Society. Live performances of her poems 'While Justice Waits' and 'Dirty Old Men' were Highly Commended in the Forward Poetry Prize.

A hardback and audiobook edition of 'Pessimism is for Lightweights - 30 Pieces of Courage and Resistance' has been published by Rough Trade Books, the title poem is on permanent display at The People's History Museum, Manchester.

Her work has also been shortlisted for the 4thWrite Short Story Prize, the Ted Hughes Award, Jerwood Compton Foundation and the Bridport Poetry Prize. Godden's work has been added to the GSCE school syllabus and the Open University. Salena Godden is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, a Patron of Hastings Book Festival and an Honorary Fellow of West Dean, Sussex.